The Great Hmong Migrations

I grew up among the Hmong diaspora, a hill people of Southeast Asia. Originally from China. they fought with the Chinese to the point wherein the 18th and 19th centuries they had to migrate to Laos, Vietnam, and Thailand in order to escape genocide. From there, they backed the French and the Americans, playing the leading role in the "Secret War" against the Vietcong and their Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos. After the communist takeover in Laos and Vietnam, the Hmong were abandoned like our recently abandoned allies in Afghanistan and were forced to flee. Because of their fealty to the Americans and French, they were hunted down and forced to flee across the Mekong River into Thailand. Living in refugee camps for about 15 years, they then came to the United States, France, and French Guiana in South America. Their close relatives in Thailand on the other hand who had backed the Communist insurgency against the Thai, were forced to be landless and stateless. Here is my long paper describing the history of these events.